BharatX, a Y Combinator-backed fintech startup has secured $4.5 million in series seed round funding led by Y Combinator, 8i Ventures, Multiply Ventures, and Soma Capital.
The round also saw participation from its existing investor Java Capital, and angel investors including, Arash Ferdowsi (Co-founder of Dropbox), Harshil Mathur (CEO & Co-founder of Razorpay), Shashank Kumar (Founder & Razorpay), Varun Alagh (Co-founder & CEO of Mamaearth), Kunal Shah (Founder and CEO of CRED), Ankur Aggarwal (Co-founder, Dunzo), Vikas Choudhury (President of Reliance Jio).
BharatX, a consumer credit venture, provides embedded credit by partnering with brands and websites to provide a credit feature in their apps to serve customers. It operates White-labeled Buy Now Pay Later and other Credit products on more than 50 consumer-facing platforms via its APIs and SDK.
The startup aims to deliver seamless embedded credit experiences on several consumer-facing platforms across India, with zero credit risk and zero operational hurdles for the Brands it partners with.
Speaking on the fundraise, Mehul Jindal, Co-founder & CEO of BharatX, said, “Consumers of India deserve a better class of Credit products out there. Today, if you look at the landscape, most players have low Credit Eligibility approval rates, long documentation sign-up processes, and unethical collection practices. We want to give the Middle Class of India easy access to credit products that they deserve yet are not able to access today while setting the bar for world-class UX and customer service while doing so. ”
“Our B2B2C business model enables us to not only win the trust of users via the Brand power of players we work with, but also enable us to reach Millions of users at Scale with almost Zero Cost. And with this new round of support from our investors, we’re looking to scale up faster & more aggressively in the near future,” he added.
The funds raised will be used to build & expand the team, enhance & develop the product further and for market expansion. BharatX further aims to increase the credit stack on offer by launching new product verticals such as UPI Credit, Pay in 3, and 15/30 day cycle products like Credit Cards.
Commenting on the investment round, Vikram Chachra, Founding Partner, 8i Ventures, said, “We committed to invest in the seed round of BharatX within our first meeting with the founders. It’s rare to find this combination of clarity of vision and flawless execution at such an early stage of a venture. Mehul and his co-founders are carving out a whole new white label BNPL category for India’s brands. We are delighted to partner with them as they pursue their audacious vision of building India’s largest BNPL platform.”
“I’ve been very impressed by Mehul and the BharatX team. They have a clear vision for the future of e-commerce in India and the talent to make it a reality. In a short time, they’ve made the “buy now, pay later” experience seamless and instantaneous for both brands and consumers. I can’t wait to see what they build next,” Arash Ferdowsi, Co-founder, of Dropbox added.
Founded in 2019, BharatX has been working with 50+ brands in India including the largest D2C brands in India, growing more than 10X in the last 4 months in volume. The founders include Mehul Nath Jindal, Eeshan Sharma, and Shyam Murugan who are also final year students of the National Institute of Technology (NIT) Trichy.